Social Work with Individuals and Groups III: Social Group Work, its Definition, Functions, Structure and Classification of Groups, Group Dynamics, Decision-Making and Leadership, the Stages of Group Development, Programme Media and Recording, and the Practice Sites of Casework and Group Work

Group structure is the stable pattern of relations within a group: its size, the roles members take, status differences, norms, communication patterns and the network of attractions and rejections. J. L. Moreno's sociometry (Who Shall Survive?, 1934) maps the last by asking members whom they would choose for an activity and drawing a sociogram, which reveals stars (often chosen), isolates (not chosen), mutual pairs and cliques; it is still used by group workers to see who is excluded. Groups are classified in several ways: primary and secondary, in-group and out-group, formal and informal, open (members join and leave) and closed (fixed membership), voluntary and involuntary (such as court-mandated groups). Ronald Toseland and Robert Rivas distinguish treatment groups, which serve members' socio-emotional needs (support, education, growth, therapy and socialisation groups), from task groups, which achieve an outcome outside the group (committees, teams, boards, coalitions).

Making a group begins before the first meeting. The worker assesses need, defines the purpose, decides on composition (homogeneous enough in purpose or problem for members to identify with each other, heterogeneous enough in coping styles to stimulate one another), size (often about six to ten for treatment groups, so that everyone can speak), open or closed membership, frequency, duration and setting, and meets prospective members to explain the group and hear their expectations. Issues of identity, diversity and marginalisation run through all of this. Groups can reproduce the exclusions of the wider society: an upper-caste majority can silence Dalit members, men can dominate a mixed group, a minority member can be made to speak for their whole community. The worker attends to these dynamics, and groups of marginalised people themselves, such as women's self-help groups, Dalit or tribal collectives and disability peer groups, are one of the strongest forms of empowerment practice because they turn shared identity into shared strength.

Group dynamics, a term associated with Kurt Lewin and his field theory, refers to the forces operating within groups. Its main determinants and indicators are cohesion (the attraction of the group for its members, which raises participation and influence but can also produce pressure to conform), norms (shared expectations of behaviour), roles, status, communication patterns, conflict and group climate. Outcomes are judged at three levels: the task (did the group achieve its purpose), the members (did they grow, feel satisfied, gain skills) and the group (did it become more cohesive and capable). Harleigh Trecker set out principles of group work that practitioners still teach: planned group formation, specific objectives, a purposeful worker-group relationship, continuous individualisation, guided group interaction, democratic group self-determination, flexible functional organisation, progressive programme experiences, resource utilisation and evaluation.

Groups make decisions by consensus, majority vote, compromise, minority or expert decision, or decision by authority. The problem-solving process in groups follows the familiar steps: defining the problem, gathering information, generating alternatives (brainstorming, with judgement postponed; or the nominal group technique of André Delbecq and Andrew Van de Ven, in which members write ideas silently before sharing and ranking them), choosing, implementing and evaluating. Irving Janis (1972) described groupthink, the deterioration of judgement in highly cohesive groups that value unanimity over realistic appraisal, with symptoms such as an illusion of invulnerability, self-censorship, pressure on dissenters and self-appointed "mindguards". Kenneth Benne and Paul Sheats (1948) classified members' functional roles as task roles (initiator, information seeker, opinion giver, coordinator, evaluator), group-building and maintenance roles (encourager, harmoniser, compromiser, gatekeeper who opens channels for quiet members) and individual or self-centred roles (aggressor, blocker, dominator, recognition-seeker) that hinder the group.

Theories of leadership moved from traits to behaviour to situation. Trait theories looked for qualities of born leaders. Behavioural studies examined styles: in the experiments of Kurt Lewin, Ronald Lippitt and Ralph White (1939) with boys' clubs, autocratic leadership produced dependence and either hostility or apathy, laissez-faire leadership produced disorganisation, and democratic leadership produced the most satisfaction, originality and independent work; the Ohio State and Michigan studies distinguished task-oriented from people-oriented behaviour. Contingency theories held that effectiveness depends on the situation: Fred Fiedler's model (1967) and Paul Hersey and Kenneth Blanchard's situational leadership, which matches telling, selling, participating or delegating to the members' readiness. James MacGregor Burns (1978) distinguished transactional from transformational leadership. In group work the worker's roles shift with the stage and model, as enabler, facilitator, mediator, educator, resource person and, in remedial groups, therapist, and the aim is usually to develop leadership among members rather than to hold it.

Bruce Tuckman (1965) described four stages of group development: forming (orientation, politeness, dependence on the leader), storming (conflict over power, roles and direction), norming (cohesion and agreed norms) and performing (work on the task, with roles flexible and functional); with Mary Ann Jensen he added a fifth, adjourning (termination), in 1977. The Boston model of James Garland, Hubert Jones and Ralph Kolodny (1965) described five stages from social work groups: preaffiliation (approach and avoidance), power and control (testing the worker and one another), intimacy (closer, family-like relations), differentiation (members accepted as individuals, the group able to manage itself) and separation. In the beginning phase the worker clarifies purpose, helps members feel safe and builds a contract; in the middle phase the worker facilitates interaction and uses conflict productively; in the ending phase the worker helps members review what they have gained and handle feelings about separation.

Group work skills include facilitating participation, clarifying, linking members' contributions, blocking harmful behaviour, summarising, modelling, confronting and managing conflict. Group climate, the emotional atmosphere of trust, acceptance and safety, decides whether members risk honesty. Communication patterns were studied by Alex Bavelas and Harold Leavitt (1951): centralised networks such as the wheel and chain are fast for simple tasks but leave peripheral members dissatisfied, while decentralised networks such as the circle and the all-channel network suit complex tasks and satisfy members more; a group worker usually aims for all-channel communication. Programme media are the activities through which group work proceeds: discussion, games, songs, drama and role-play, arts and crafts, sports, outings, puppetry and projects. Programme is a means, not an end: an activity is chosen for what it does for members and the group, such as a game that forces cooperation or a drama that lets adolescents rehearse refusing drugs.

Group work recording combines records of each session (attendance, programme, interaction, roles, the worker's interventions and assessment), periodic summaries, individual notes on members, and sociograms to track changes in relationships. Monitoring and evaluation use attendance and participation data, members' self-reports and feedback, observation of interaction, pre- and post-group measures of the targeted skills or feelings, and goal-attainment scaling, so that the group can be judged against the purpose set when it was formed.

The syllabus lists the client groups and settings where casework and group work are practised: children, correctional settings, health, women, persons with disabilities, older persons, oppressed groups, religious minorities, persons who are gay and lesbian, and other socially and economically disadvantaged groups. The two methods are combined in each: casework with a child in a children's home and a life-skills group for all its adolescents; casework with a prisoner and a pre-release group; counselling a newly diagnosed patient and running a support group for people living with HIV or diabetes; casework with a survivor of domestic violence and a women's collective; individual rehabilitation plans and peer groups for persons with disabilities; home visits to an isolated older person and a day-care group; and support to individuals from oppressed castes or religious minorities facing discrimination alongside groups that build collective voice.

Practice with gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender persons is named in the syllabus, and the law around it has changed. In Navtej Singh Johar v Union of India (2018) the Supreme Court read down section 377 of the Indian Penal Code so far as it criminalised consensual sexual conduct between adults, holding that sexual orientation is protected by the rights to equality, dignity, privacy and expression. National Legal Services Authority v Union of India (2014) recognised transgender persons' right to self-identify their gender, and the Transgender Persons (Protection of Rights) Act 2019 prohibits discrimination against them in education, employment, healthcare and services. Affirmative practice follows: the worker treats sexual orientation and gender identity as part of the person, not a problem to be changed; works on the problems clients actually bring, which are often family rejection, forced marriage, harassment, homelessness and discrimination; respects confidentiality closely, because disclosure can bring violence; and uses support groups and community organisations. Attempts to change a person's sexual orientation ("conversion therapy") are rejected by the professional bodies of social work, psychiatry and psychology.